Eighth of an Acre Bounty

This past week has been pretty busy. So busy that I never got to read the book I was supposed to by this afternoon, I haven’t kept up at all with posting this week and here we are staring down a rapidly approaching Monday. Saturday was another busy day, full of meat grinding and mixing in the morning then straight off to our first 5 hour beginners beekeeping class in the afternoon. After class we headed back home to grind meat again and do a bit more cooking (all of the meat grinding will be detailed in the next post, I promise). So dinner had to be something quick that didn’t take any oven space and was relatively simple.

It is precisely times like these that I realize the value of canning our summer harvests and having jars of goodies readily available. After a quick look at the state of the kitchen and the stores in my office I arrived at Tomato Soup. I diced up several large cloves of garlic along with some shallot and sauteed in olive oil. I added a jar of home-canned tomato sauce and a quart of canned chicken stock as well. Seasoned with salt, pepper, and a bit of smoked paprika. I finished the soup with a bit of cream and stirred in some pesto I made last year and had frozen precisely for a time like this. It could have only been made better by a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches to accompany alongside, but we had not the space or the attention to dedicate to that.

Next up: The great offal experiment of 2009….